Let me just start out by saying that this is a tragic story. I take absolutely zero joy in the destruction of anyones personal life regardless of whether I agree with them or not. Even the left is outraged over this one – and they should be:

John Edwards repeatedly lied during his Presidential campaign about an extramarital affair with a novice filmmaker, the former Senator admitted to ABC News today.

In an interview for broadcast tonight on Nightline, Edwards told ABC News correspondent Bob Woodruff he did have an affair with 44-year old Rielle Hunter, but said that he did not love her.

Edwards also denied he was the father of Hunter’s baby girl, Frances Quinn, although the one-time Democratic Presidential candidate said he has not taken a paternity test.

Well, since he didn’t love her, it’s okay that he made a run for the Democratic Party’s nomination knowing that he was lying through his teeth about this. And a Friday news dump on the day of the opening ceremonies of the Olympics? Coward.

I don’t care what your politics are – don’t freakin cheat on your wife. Another sad day as yet another sad politician eats large quantities of crap – as he should. I feel horrible for his wife.

This story has been going on for a while now – but finally the media is picking it up. You read more here. And cheers to Kaus not being bullied into suppressing the story like the rest of our media.

My dear friends on the left, this is the chairman of your party, Howard Dean:

Recently Dean has been passing around this:

John McCain wants to stay in Iraq for 100 years. He’s said it, and it’s on tape.
But his campaign hates that he was caught. They’ve viciously attacked anyone who reminded the American people that he said it, including me. They’ve said that those who reference the 100 years comments are “deliberately misleading voters.”

So we’ve taken John McCain’s own words — video of him saying that 100 years would be “fine with me” — and made a TV ad. There’s no confusion, no distortion, no misleading — it’s John McCain, on tape, for voters to judge on their own.
It’s one of the most powerful political ads I’ve ever seen. It’s devastating — and the McCain campaign will spend the rest of the election trying to fight it.

My friends, I have commented about this before (here and here), and it is an outright lie. If DNC Chairman Howard Dean is concerned about “deliberately misleading voters,” why doesn’t he play the whole quote from John McCain? Here is video of what John McCain said:

“Make it a hundred”

“We’ve been in Japan for 60 years. We’ve been in South Korea for 50 years or so. That would be fine with me, as long as Americans are not being injured or harmed or wounded or killed.”

“It’s fine with me and I hope it would be fine with you if we maintained a presence in a very volatile part of the world.”

Hello? Does that equal wanting 100 years of war in Iraq? Only if you have no clue what we are doing in Japan, South Korea, etc… Or of course – if you just totally ignore that part of his statement. Charles Krauthammer illuminates the following folks who have done just that:

“He (McCain) says that he is willing to send our troops into another 100 years of war in Iraq” (Barack Obama, Feb. 19)

“We are bogged down in a war that John McCain now suggests might go on for another 100 years” (Obama, Feb. 26)

“He’s (McCain) willing to keep this war going for 100 years” (Hillary Clinton, March 17).

“What date between now and the election in November will he (McCain) drop this promise of a 100-year war in Iraq?” (Chris Matthews, March 4)

Why, even a CNN anchor (Rick Sanchez) buys it: “John McCain is telling us … that we need to win even if it takes 100 years” (March 16). “

As Lenin is said to have said: “A lie told often enough becomes truth.” And as this lie passes into truth, the Democrats are ready to deploy it “as the linchpin of an effort to turn McCain’s national security credentials against him,” reports David Paul Kuhn of the Politico.

Hence: A Howard Dean fundraising letter charging McCain with seeking “an endless war in Iraq.” And a Democratic National Committee press release in which Dean asserts: “McCain’s strategy is a war without end. . . . Elect John McCain and get 100 years in Iraq.

[…]

The Democrats are undeterred. “It’s seldom you get such a clean shot,” a senior Obama adviser told the Politico. It’s seldom that you see such a dirty lie.

Howard Dean whines that he’s been “viciously attacked.” Cry me a river. He deserves whatever he’s getting for his dishonest and cynical pandering to unadulterated isolationist sentiment (which is becoming quite a trend in the Democratic Party; remember John Kerry’s disgraceful “opening firehouses in Baghdad and shutting them in the United States of America” remark in his 2004 acceptance speech). Of course, Iraq may never become the place where “Americans are not being injured or harmed or wounded or killed,” in which case keeping American troops there may not be in our best interest. But McCain never said he supported keeping American soldiers in harm’s way for “100 years.” In fact, he explicitly warned against it. Howard Dean, Barack Obama and any semi-sentient person who bothered to spend 30 seconds listening to McCain’s answer knows what he meant.

So here is my question to my dear friends on the left (and I really mean this, as some of my best friends are totally rational people and center left politically) – What do you think of this? Remember – this isn’t some random gaffe from a nobody- these are the leaders of your party and presidential contenders. Ultimately, do you agree with the positions of the democratic party leadership? The reason I ask, is because – at least, as far as my friends on the left go – I don’t actually believe that you do.

I used to lean left politically too – but once I actually discovered where the left actually stood on issues (even more importantly – once I really learned where conservative philosophy stood) I realized that I held conservative values.

I have no problem with people questioning whether or not McCain’s idea is good on the merits of it’s full context. (aka. maintaining a military presence similar to Japan and N. Korea.) But the Democratic leadership are not doing this, and instead, are distorting what McCain clearly said.